WikiLeaks Founder Granted Bail, With Conditions

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was granted bail, with conditions, this morning by a London judge, but Swedish prosecutors may block his release.

If released, Assange must surrender his passport and agree to travel restrictions, adhere to a curfew and wear an electronic tracking device. He must remain at a Suffolk mansion and report into a local police station each evening. His bail was set at £240,000 ($320,000).

But according to the Guardian, Swedish prosecutors plan to launch an appeal against the court’s decision to grant Assange bail. They have two hours to file the appeal, which would be followed by a hearing within 48 hours. Assange would be held in custody throughout that process.

Assange has been in custody in London on an arrest warrant issued from Sweden, based on allegations made by two women there. The allegations include one count of unlawful coercion, two counts of sexual molestation and one count of rape.

The first complainant, identified by Swedish authorities as “Miss A,” alleged that she was a victim of “unlawful coercion” on August 14 in Stockholm. In that instance, Assange allegedly used his body weight to hold her down so that he could have sex with her.

In the second charge involving sexual molestation, Miss A alleges that Assange had sex with her without wearing a condom, although she had made it her “express wish” that he use one.

The third charge claims that Assange “deliberately molested” Miss A on August 18 “in a way designed to violate her sexual integrity”.

The fourth charge involves a second complainant, identified as “Miss W,” who spent the night with Assange on August 17 and accused him of having sex with her while she slept, without her consent and without wearing a condom.

During his bail hearing Tuesday, Assange’s defense attorney Geoffrey Robertson told the court that he doubted that the allegations against his client would be considered rape under English law.

Swedish authorities issued the arrest warrant for Assange last month in order to bring him in for questioning, though no charges against him have been filed. This was followed by an Interpol “red notice” issued for Assange’s arrest, due to the fact that he was no longer in Sweden.

Assange’s attorney, Mark Stephens, has said that if his client were extradited to Sweden, he understands that authorities there planned to “defer their interest in him to the Americans,” essentially taking a backseat to any criminal complaint the United States has against Assange.

“It does seem to me that what we have here [in Sweden] is nothing more than a holding charge,” Stephens told Al Jazeera recently. The United States simply wants Assange detained in whatever way possible so that “ultimately they can get their mitts on him,” he said.

Assange volunteered last week to surrender at a London police station to answer the warrant. At a court hearing in Westminster he was denied bail and was remanded in custody until today’s hearing.

Assange is expected to fight extradition to Sweden.

His lawyer told the Daily Mail that his client had not been receiving mail in prison and that a Time magazine issue sent to Assange by the magazine’s editors, had been destroyed instead of being passed to him. The issue features Assange, with the American flag gagging his mouth, on its cover.

Illustration: WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange appears in Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London last week, where he was denied bail after appearing on an extradition warrant. Elizabeth Cook/AP

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